


passed down like folk songs

by societybabylon



Category: The Society (TV 2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, F/M, Fluff, Mutual Pining, other characters also included it just varies based from one-shot to one-shot
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-19
Updated: 2020-08-21
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:47:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25999234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/societybabylon/pseuds/societybabylon
Summary: A collection of short one-shots based on song lyrics and followers' requests.
Relationships: Harry Bingham/Allie Pressman
Kudos: 11





	1. you said the way my blue eyes shined put those Georgia stars to shame that night (I said that's a lie)

When Allie got to the picnic spot, Harry was already there. Her close friend had spread out a blue cloth on the ground and was sprawled out across it, scrolling aimlessly through his phone. He had set up their picnic on the shores of a lake. Water rocked back and forth along the beach while ducks paddled playfully in the shallows.

She parked her car and started walking over to Harry, inhaling the scent of flowers. A gentle, balmy breeze played with the hem of her short blue dress, blowing the fabric up and around her legs. It was the rare perfect Connecticut August day: no humidity, no scorching temperatures, just sun and lazy bliss.

“Harry!” Allie called out to him. 

He looked up from his phone and beamed at her. “Hey.”

“Why did you ask me to a picnic?” Allie asked. 

“Can’t I ask my very good friend to have lunch with me?” 

His response was a non-answer, meaning he had probably made these plans with someone else before he’d called her. Maybe he had originally intended on picnicking with his girlfriend but had to rearrange after they got into another one of their vicious arguments. If that were the case, it wouldn’t surprise Allie; it seemed like Harry and Kelly fought at least once a week. 

Allie sat down on the picnic blanket beside him. She shucked off her sandals and plunged her bare feet into the warm sand. 

“Whatever you say,” she teased. “But you know you can tell me the truth, don’t you?”

He paused and brushed a hair through his curls. He gave her a reluctant, impish grin. “Alright, the truth is that Kelly’s mad at me, so…” 

“Oh, I get it. I’m your backup plan.” She winked and smiled at him as if she didn’t care. 

He laughed and grabbed a black backpack he had brought with him. He unzipped it, revealing a trove of delicious food. Slices of ripe summer stone fruits dripped with pink and red juice. Two Caprese sandwiches with milky white mozzarella and enormous, vividly green basil leaves were tucked neatly in paper sandwich wrappers. 

“This looks delicious.” She picked a peach slice out of his Tupperware and ate it. Sweetness burst on her tongue. Her eyes went wide with amazement. “Mmm, it is delicious.” 

Harry was gazing at her almost reverentially. It was a look that he usually only reserved for his girlfriend, one of adoration and affection. For years, she had wished that he would look at her like that. She had dreamed that he would fall for her and they would start dating. But her fantasies never became reality, and instead, she watched from the sidelines as he hooked up with other girls.

“Has anyone ever told you how beautiful your eyes are?” he said. 

Allie stilled. Was he trying to come onto her? No, he couldn’t be. Not when he had ignored her interest for years.

“Don’t lie to me, Harry.” 

“It’s not a lie. I mean it.” He spoke with earnestness and charm. She couldn’t believe it. He was trying to flirt with her. 

Allie turned away from him, away from those eyes that kept searching her face for something that she couldn’t give him. She knew what he wanted. He wanted proof that she loved him, or at the very least was attracted to him. He wanted to use her to boost his own self-esteem, and that was it. 

She stared out at the view in front of her, trying to ignore the boy beside her. And what a beautiful view it was. The late summer sunlight glittered on the lake like a string of diamonds on blue velvet. She yearned to dive into those cold depths and ice the heat in her veins. 

“I mean it, Allie,” he repeated. She refused to look at him, but she could hear a shuffling sound to her left. Suddenly, she felt the warmth of his body beside her. He had moved closer to her, so close that they were almost touching. He exhaled, and his breath tickled her neck. “Why won’t you look at me?”

She snapped her head towards him, only to find his face mere inches away from hers. If she leaned forward, they’d be touching. Kissing, maybe. He sucked in a shaky breath, as if he hadn’t actually expected her to turn and face him. This time, when he exhaled, his breath brushed over her lips. 

“I’m looking at you now,” she said. 

“Allie…” He tilted toward her. In a moment, he was touching her. His forehead rested against hers gently, and he was staring at her more intimately than ever before. 

For a second, she considered closing the gap between them. Pressing her lips to his and letting the rest of the world melt away. But then an image of Kelly, betrayed and heartbroken, sliced through her mind. 

She pulled away before he could get any closer. “I should go.”

“Wait, Allie. I’m sorry. Please stay. I shouldn’t have—”

“No, you shouldn’t have.” She stood up abruptly. The picnic cloth wrinkled beneath her feet. “In case you’ve forgotten, you have a girlfriend. And using me to heal your wounded pride just because you know I like you…that’s cruel. I’m not going to be anyone’s second choice, Harry. Not even yours.”


	2. you fucked me so good I almost said I love you

Harry Bingham rested against the wooden headboard of his bed, waves of euphoria pulsing through his body. Allie Pressman, the cause of said euphoria, was reapplying her red lipstick in his bedroom mirror. He studied her with the reverence of a scholar enchanted by a work of art.

Becoming friends-with-benefits with her was both the best and worst idea he’d ever had. They were finally acting on years of unspoken mutual attraction. And damn if it didn’t feel good. Too good. But now he had a problem on his hands: he wanted to be more than friends with her.

Unfortunately, it seemed like she didn’t feel the same way. Every single time they hooked up, Allie left almost as soon as she finished fucking him. She said she didn’t want anything other than sex. No cuddling or pillow talk. According to her, it was too intimate.

But maybe this time, he could convince her to stay.

Allie walked over to the side of his bed and sat down. She grabbed her socks from where they lay discarded on the floor and put them on. The only things that remained were her shoes. Once she put those on, she’d be gone.

Harry inched over on the bed until he was close enough to touch her. He ran a hand through the ends of her soft blonde hair and admired how it gleamed in the room’s dim lighting.

“Mm,” she murmured. “That feels nice. But you better stop. It’s my time to leave.”

“You know you can stay, right? I don’t want you to feel like I’m kicking you out.” God, did that sound as desperate to her as it did to him? He hoped not.

“Can’t. Cassandra’s waiting for me. And you don’t want her to find out about us, do you?” She looked over her shoulder and flashed him a devilish smile that made him want to sit up and kiss her.

“Yeah, you’re right,” he agreed. He didn’t tell her that actually, he didn’t care if Cassandra found out about them. He just wanted a little more time to bask in her light.

He looked away as Allie put on her shoes and checked through her purse to make sure she hadn’t forgotten anything. Maybe one day she would reciprocate his feelings. But not today.

“See you next time, Bingham,” Allie said. He turned back to face her, only to see she was already standing in the doorway. She winked at him and then she was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one was requested by an anon on tumblr.


	3. I'll do anything to get to the rush

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning: this one-shot has implied drug abuse. this one was requested by an anon on tumblr.

Harry Bingham could barely breathe. His chest felt tight, so tight. Each inhale was a struggle, a fight against suffocation.

Were those people up above him? His vision was so blurry. But he could hear fractured sentences:

“What the—”

“—his heartbeat—”

“—hospital! He needs to go to the—”

And then everything went black.

———

Bright lights. Harry opened his eyes to a glaringly bright room. Not his bedroom, he quickly realized. A hospital room.

Fuck. 

He turned his head to look around the room and froze when he saw his sister sitting by his bedside. She had her face turned away from him, but he could see that she had been crying for a long time. The front of her shirt was smattered with dark patches, wet from her tears. Her makeup was a goopy mess on her face, a rarity for her. 

“Hey.”

He said it so softly that he could barely hear his own voice. She must have heard him, though, because she jumped in her chair and turned to face him.

“Oh. You’re awake.” She sniffled and tried to rub away her tears with the sleeves of her black shirt. “How are you feeling?”

“Not great.” An understatement. 

“Not great? Not great?” Fresh tears burst up. He could see the deep sadness in her eyes, hear the anger in her words. “Harry, you overdosed and all you have to say is that you don’t feel great? You’ve put us through hell! We were so worried about you.”

He tried to remember the previous night. He had spent the afternoon with his mom, gone home alone, called Campbell and…and then what? Every event after that call with his drug dealer was a blank.

“Do you even remember what you took?” Each word from her was choked.

He didn’t speak. What could he say to her? No, he didn’t remember what he had taken, but it didn’t really matter. At this point, he had tried pretty much everything there was to try. 

He knew he shouldn’t reach for the pills, the powder, the drinks. He loathed himself for doing it. But no one else knew how lonely it felt at night, when he twisted around in cold sheets and dreamed of a woman he would never see again. She had filled his life with so much warmth. Without her, he felt an unending emptiness. 

His sister kept talking. “You don’t remember, do you? You took a fucking cocktail of drugs, Harry. You would be dead if we hadn’t gotten you here in time.”

She paused. Again, he was silent. 

His sister sighed deeply. “I know you’re sad that she’s gone, but you can’t keep doing this to yourself. If you die, half of our family will be dead. I need you, Harry. Mom needs you. We need you just like you needed Dad and Allie.”

His head throbbed with pain at the sound of Allie’s name. Memories burned through his head. 

The first time they met: she had a smile that said trouble and an attitude to match. He was weary of her—he and Allie’s sister, Cassandra, were rivals—but intrigued, too. Allie dared him to jump into an ice-cold lake. She thought he was too much of a coward to do it, but he dived right in with his clothes still on.

Their first date: he took her to a fancy sushi restaurant in New York City. She wore a red dress with a plunging neckline and a glittering necklace. She’d looked so beautiful. He was so busy staring at her that he almost walked into a pole. Harry could still hear an echo of her laughter from that day.

Their engagement: he’d spent three weeks going to different jewelers to find the right ring for Allie. They’d been together for five years, but still, he worried that she would reject him. For the proposal, he took her to the lake where they first met. It was springtime. Blue and red flowers were blooming everywhere. She picked a red flower and tucked it behind his ear, then kissed him. He got down on one knee. She said yes.

The car crash: he was surrounded by shattered windows and warped metal. He could feel blood dripping from his forehead, but he was otherwise uninjured. He looked over to the passenger seat, where Allie was sitting. She wasn’t breathing. 

“Don’t say her name,” he growled. 

“Oh, Harry.” His sister got out of her chair and walked over to the door. She was leaving, Harry realized. He was going to be alone again. “We’re all sad that she died. We loved her. But you can’t live like this forever. One of these days, you’ll have to get over Allie Pressman.”


	4. I would marry you in an instant

The church was buzzing as everyone waited for the bride to arrive. All of West Ham, dressed in their finest, prattled and gossiped as they sat in the church pews.

“…so smart, that girl. She’s going to do great things…”

“…Pressman, all grown-up. I remember the first time she brought her boyfriend home from Yale, and now…”

The talk floated through the open church doors to the outdoors, where Allie was waiting with the rest of the wedding processional. She smiled when she heard others complementing her sister, the amazing bride-to-be. Cassandra deserved all the praise she got—she was a generous sister, a talented lawyer, and she had picked a caring fiancé. On top of all that, she led every step of her wedding planning, and it was shaping up to be a fantastic day.

Or so Allie hoped. Cassandra, who was notoriously punctual, had yet to appear at the church. The guests had been waiting for ten minutes now, but the bride was still missing.

“You look beautiful,” Harry, her boyfriend, said. Though he wasn’t part of the processional (meaning he was supposed to inside the church with most of the other guests), he had snuck out to talk to her. “I’m going to have to fight to keep all the groomsmen away from you.”

Allie rolled her eyes, but couldn’t suppress her grin. Only Harry could make her feel both exasperated and flattered with a single sentence.

“I don’t think any of the groomsmen would be interested in me right now. My sleep deprivation is written all over my face,” she said. “I’m more excited for Cassandra than anyone else, but I’m going to be so happy when this is over. Who knew that planning a wedding could be so exhausting? I feel like I haven’t slept in six months.”

“You’re going to have to stay awake a little longer, because I have a lot of plans for our hotel room tonight.”

“Harry,” Allie glanced around to make sure no one heard him. In a whisper, she said, “My parents are right over there.”

“Sorry.” He winked at her, shameless as always. “I can’t help myself.”

Allie reprimanded him, “You’re incorrigible, you know—”

“Places, everyone! I just got word that Cassandra is minutes away.” Allie’s mom ordered, silencing all the chatter around her. Then, noticing the intruder in their midst for the first time, she said, “Harry, get back inside the church. What are you even doing here?”

“Sorry, Mrs. Pressman. I’ll go,” he replied. Before he left, he told Allie, “It’s your time to shine. You’re going to be the best Maid-of-Honor ever.”

“Thanks, babe. See you at the reception.” Then, because she couldn’t resist, she said, “I’ll do my best to stay away from the groomsmen, but no promises.”

Harry just smiled and rushed back inside.

He took his seat just in time. A limousine pulled up at the entrance to the church. A moment later, Cassandra stepped out, radiant as always.

“Sorry I’m late. Is everyone ready?”

+

Despite Cassandra’s tardiness, the wedding went smoothly from then on.

As Allie watched her sister exchange her vows, she was struck with an acute pang of longing. She wanted this for herself. She wanted Harry to be waiting for her at the altar. She wanted to be the one walking down the aisle.

Allie looked away from Cassandra and over to Harry, who was sitting in the church pews. To her surprise, he was looking at her, too. He had an almost wonderstruck expression on his face. She had never seen him like this before.

I wonder if he’s thinking the same thing that I’m thinking, Allie thought. I would marry you in an instant.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well, guys, it looks like the society got canceled. part of me is naively hopeful that the show can get saved, but honestly, it's highly unlikely. I wrote this little one-shot a few days ago; the prompt was submitted by an anon. 
> 
> at this point, I'm not sure exactly what to do with my soulmate au story, which is a longer story. hopefully I'll have the inspiration to continue it, but it's hard when the show got canceled.

**Author's Note:**

> this is the first of a series of one-shots that I have posted to my tumblr but have never previously posted on ao3. this one was requested by in-my-head-I-do-everything-right a.k.a. still_i_fall


End file.
